New York Public Library Buys Schlesinger Papers

By ROBIN POGREBIN

Published: November 26, 2007

In a 1976 letter accompanying seven chapters of his biography of Robert F. Kennedy, Arthur M. Schlesinger Jr. advises his editor at Houghton Mifflin to prepare for ''a very long book and promote it.''

''After all, Caro's 'Moses' did well,'' he writes, referring to Robert Caro's biography of Robert Moses. ''Moses was not involved in nearly as many things or people as RFK; and this book, I trust, is a good deal better written.''

The letter, with its characteristic mixture of candor and confidence, is just a fraction of an inch in the 280 linear feet of Schlesinger documents -- from his travel diaries of the 1930s to his phone message log from the 1980s -- that have been acquired by the New York Public Library in a deal to be announced today. (The dollar amount was not disclosed.)

In October the Penguin Press published almost 1,000 pages of excerpts from Mr. Schlesinger's journals. The library's acquisition includes about 5,000 additional journal pages, along with datebooks, research files, sound recordings, clippings and correspondence between Mr. Schlesinger and noteworthy figures including Dean Acheson, Truman Capote, Lauren Bacall and Bill Clinton.

''He was a great historian and an incomparable witness,'' said Paul LeClerc, president of the library. ''I can't think of any other historian who had the level of access he did. Voltaire was the historian of France, but he didn't get in the inner circle the way Schlesinger did.''

In his long career Mr. Schlesinger was, among other things, a speechwriter for John F. Kennedy during the 1960 presidential campaign, a special assistant to the president from 1961 to 1964 and a trustee of the Robert F. Kennedy Memorial. He was also active in Edward M. Kennedy's 1980 presidential campaign. He won two Pulitzer Prizes and two National Book Awards and taught history at the City University of New York.

Mr. Schlesinger wanted the library to be his papers' final resting place; negotiations for the acquisition were almost complete when he died of a heart attack in February at 89.

''It was his preferred place because of his connection to the public library and the city of New York,'' said Andrew Wylie, Mr. Schlesinger's literary agent.

The papers, which cover much of Mr. Schlesinger's life, will be available to the public in a year or two, after they have been processed and cataloged. Another collection of Schlesinger documents resides at the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum in Boston.

''We expect it to be used almost constantly,'' William Stingone, a curator of manuscripts at the library, said of the Schlesinger acquisition. ''It's definitely one of the most concentrated collections of correspondence that I've seen.''

About one-third of the 400 boxes of material consist of Mr. Schlesinger's voluminous correspondence, which in many cases includes both sides of the exchange. Mr. Schlesinger routinely stapled copies of his responses to letters that he had received. ''It's not just who he corresponded with,'' Mr. Stingone said. ''It's that these were two- or three-page letters exchanged -- often about the most pressing topics of the day.''

In his letters Mr. Schlesinger writes in a straightforward manner, unafraid to cajole opponents and confront friends. ''I am frank to say that your column this weekend strikes me as less than a friendly act,'' he writes to the humorist Art Buchwald in 1967, about a column in which Mr. Schlesinger had been criticized. ''I do think I might have been entitled to a pre-flight consultation before you let fly.''

With their references to dinner parties, theater engagements and travel plans, the letters reveal a highly social and cultural existence. They also show that Mr. Schlesinger took politics personally.

In a letter to the political philosopher Isaiah Berlin in 1972 he writes: ''General Rabin has made himself an ardent private, and now public, propagandist for the Nixon administration. He has made George McGovern a particular target. Mrs. Meir's disclaimer is not enough. It would help if you could pass word along to friends in Israel that they really must pull Rabin out if they can't shut him up.''

Without so much as a transition Mr. Schlesinger continues: ''I am now on the verge of fatherhood. It is 23 years since I was last a father, so I feel a little out of practice. I will send up smoke signals when the great moment arrives.''

In an October 1967 letter to George Kennan at Princeton University, Mr. Schlesinger turns to the war in Vietnam, writing: ''Your point that 'no outside power can hope to do more than the government of that country can do for itself' is, of course, absolutely crucial. Kennedy used to speak of it as 'their war'; Johnson calls it 'our war.' And you are right too in emphasizing that the administration has not tried seriously to answer the question why the purpose and morale of the Vietnamese who oppose us are so much firmer and better than the purpose and morale of the Vietnamese ... on our side.''

The cache of papers includes a draft of the speech Mr. Schlesinger wrote for George McGovern's acceptance of the Democratic presidential nomination in 1972. ''We meet at a time of crisis in our democracy,'' he wrote, ''a time of deep stalemate and frustration -- a time when many Americans are losing confidence not only in our present leadership but in our institutions and even in the future of our nation itself.''

In a note to Mr. McGovern's staff attached to the speech, Mr. Schlesinger says: ''Tell the Senator: I hope that some of this may be helpful -- but I know you will not hesitate to discard and forget if it does not express what it is in your mind to say.''

Despite the ego that comes through in much of Mr. Schlesinger's writings, his early journals, from the 1930s, also offer a window onto a man trying to find his way in the world. Filling bound notebooks in a painstakingly precise longhand, he wrote of his journeys, anxieties and expectations.

''This stuffiness of mine has been troubling me more of late, esp since I met J. L. who is almost wholly without it,'' he writes in 1935-36, of a woman whose identity is unknown. ''Last night as we were dancing -- she had just shown me a new step -- she remarked how quickly I picked up the step. Then she said, 'But you should let yourself go more.' I may put too big a value on my dignity.''

He also keeps an almost quaint daily account of his vices in entries like this one:

''cigarettes -- half a dozen

''love --

''work --

''liquor -- plenty''

PHOTO: Arthur M. Schlesinger Jr. strolling on familiar turf in 1965. (PHOTOGRAPH BY GEORGE TAMES/THE NEW YORK TIMES)